


Jersey Penicillin

by MDJensen



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: (my second soup-centric H50 fic), Danny's canonical love of matzo ball soup, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Sick Steve, Steve has seriously been through hell and he just wants to rest, mention of canonical character deaths, sad Steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-29 23:16:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19840570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MDJensen/pseuds/MDJensen
Summary: A friendship, as seen through the lens of soup. Spans all seasons, but with a focus on 9.





	Jersey Penicillin

All things considered, it’s not surprising how quickly they become friends. Real friends, to be clear. Stupid-inside-joke friends, don’t-need-an-invitation friends, cry-on-each-other’s-shoulder friends—not that that really happens, at least not on Steve’s part, but he’s confident that it could, if he ever needed it. Danny has his back. But Danny has his back in a prickly, grouchy, unsentimental sort of way—so it _does_ surprise Steve, quite a lot, actually, the first time Danny plunks a giant lunchbox on his desk.

“Excuse me?” Steve croaks.

“You’re excused,” Danny snaps, with a wave of one hand.

“What’s with the—?”

“Soup?” Danny supplies, and okay, so at least Steve knows that much now. “What’s with the soup? Says the man who has been literally hacking up a lung for three days straight now?”

Confusion gives way to surprise—then fondness, and Steve feels himself grin. “Danno, you bought me soup?”

“I _made_ you soup,” Danny corrects.

“That’s so sweet.”

“Sweet? It’s sweet? In your entire vocabulary, that’s, that’s— the best you could come up with? Why couldn’t it be _nice_?”

“It is nice. It’s also sweet.”

Danny’s annoyed now, so Steve’s work is done; he sits back and watches his partner unpack not one, but two thermoses from the lunchbox. He unscrews them both. Then he takes—something?—out of the smaller one, moves it carefully to the other.

“They get soggy,” Danny grumbles. “You can’t leave ‘em in the broth.”

“What gets soggy?”

“Matzo balls.”

“ _Matzo_ _balls_?”

“You have an ear infection now? Wouldn’t surprise me, how bad that cold is.”

“You made me matzo ball soup?” Steve clarifies, because actually, that’s more than sweet. That’s fucking _fatherly_ , and though he’s still smiling, now he’s aching a bit too. Not that Dad ever made him anything from scratch.

Danny just sighs. “Keeps you hydrated, keeps you fed, loosens all the gunk in there. _And_ it tastes good, _and_ it’s easy on the stomach. Jersey penicillin.”

“Don’t you mean Jewish penicillin?” Steve laughs. Because he’s not an expert, but he’s pretty sure that’s how it goes.

“Same thing. Would you just eat, please?” Danny glowers, waving tightly. “We have been over this. We have been over how this is gonna work.”

Being partners, is what he means. And yeah, they’ve had that discussion a few times by now, though Steve’s pretty sure that none of those conversations specifically included them making soup for each other, if one of them got sick.

But he doesn’t protest anymore. His throat kind of hurts anyway, so less talking would be preferable.

There’s already a spoon sticking out of the thermos for him, so he takes it, gets a few noodles and some broth into his mouth.

“’s good.”

“Don’t say that like you think I don’t know it. Eat!” Danny adds. And then he’s gone, and the door is swinging shut behind him; but the soup is actually pretty delicious, so Steve keeps eating it anyway.

*

For a while, Steve more or less forgets about it. Not that there aren’t times he couldn’t use a little comfort; but Danny has his own shit going on, and there’s no soup around for a while.

Then Malia dies. And for weeks, Danny brings Chin matzo ball soup for lunch, more to take home for dinner, and no, Steve isn’t jealous, but yes, he remembers it fondly. It tasted good; felt good. Felt like somebody went out of their way for him, not to save his life or help him on a mission but to look after _him_. Steve McGarrett, the person.

And to be honest, though of course he’s glad Doris is alive—he kind of needs that more than ever.

Danny seems to know that it’s getting to him. He asks about Doris, with questions both pointed and not; offers himself to come by the house, any time, if tempers start flaring. But his mother’s not a problem to be solved. He doesn’t know how to explain—to Danny, sometimes even to himself—that he doesn’t need a solution.

He needs—

Something else.

But Danny works it out.

It’s a few weeks since Doris’ return, and Steve’s having a harder time of it than usual; she’s out for the night, and he takes advantage of the empty house not to have Catherine over but to lie on the couch and brood. It’s not a good look on him, and he knows it. But he’s rolled with a lot of punches in his life and he’s allowed—he’s _fucking allowed_ —to admit how much they hurt, once in a while.

The doorbell rings.

Steve tells himself that he’s heard the Camaro, as he hoists himself up, shuffles to the door. But that could be wishful thinking. It could be any number of people, most of whom would have good intentions but only three or four of whom he’d be genuinely happy to see—and Danny would be one of those, of course, but he didn’t mention stopping by—

He peers through the window.

It is; it’s Danny; and why did he ever doubt it? Slightly off-kilter with relief, Steve pulls the door open.

On the doorstep, Danny bounces on his toes. He peers into the house behind Steve before inviting himself in, carrying a large, familiar lunchbox.

“Your mom around?”

“Out for the night.” Steve’s voice sounds worse than he’d have expected.

“Okay. You want company?”

“Not really.”

“’s fine. You eat dinner?”

Steve can only shake his head.

“Figured. I, uh. I made you soup. You’re welcome,” he adds, when Steve doesn’t respond.

“Thanks,” Steve murmurs, reflexively.

“Should still be warm. Went right, right from stove to thermos. Hang on.”

Danny marches into the kitchen; Steve trails him silently, and watches as he gets out Steve’s favorite bowl and a spoon. He sets it all on the table, fills the bowl with noodles and broth and three matzo balls.

“Okay. There’s enough for tomorrow, too; just don’t get smart and stick it all in one thermos, or—”

“They get soggy,” Steve croaks. “I know.”

“Good.” Danny sighs. “I’m headed out, then.”

“Thanks, Danno.”

His partner considers him openly, for a long moment; whatever tests he’s running, Steve’s pretty sure he doesn’t pass. Then: “you want a hug?”

Steve does, obviously, but doesn’t feel like saying it. But Danny doesn’t wait for a response, just swoops him close and hugs him anyway.

Steve untenses, just a little, and hugs him back.

“Hang in there, babe,” Danny murmurs, squeezing. Which means, objectively, nothing, but it helps to hear it anyway.

“You still rather be alone?” Danny asks, pulling away.

Part of him wants to take it back, but Steve nods.

“’kay. But eat. Please?”

More nodding. Danny pats him on the back, and leaves.

But Steve takes his time, eating the soup, and feels Danny’s arms still around him until the last drop is gone.

*

From that moment on, matzo ball soup is officially Something Danny Does. Steve doesn’t mind in the slightest. Danny makes it after Freddie’s funeral; he makes it after Kono and Doris and Adam leave Hawaii. He makes it after Deb’s diagnosis. Makes it after Catherine decides to stay in Afghanistan.

After a while Steve finds himself more or less conditioned; shit goes down, and Steve keeps his favorite bowl clean and waits for Danny to show up, lunchbox in hand.

Matzo ball soup isn’t his favorite, actually. He likes it—he likes most foods—but it’s not something he’d probably ever crave, otherwise. On a normal day, he prefers steak, chili, stuff like that. When he’s sick or needs comfort, he wants eggs, toast, pancakes: familiar, breakfast-y things.

Danny knows that. He’ll make him those too, if Steve asks, but there’s no denying that the soup means something special.

Soup means Danny’s worried about him. Sometimes that’s what Steve needs, even more than the meal itself.

*

Danny’s around even more than usual, when Deb dies. He brings beer and looks after Joanie and helps with paperwork and logistics.

No soup, at first, but that’s pretty normal. There’s usually a few days between the precipitating event and the soup itself, since making it is fairly time-intensive (especially when Danny does the broth from scratch).

Which is perfect, really. Because it usually takes a few days for Steve to really process anyway, which means that the soup shows up exactly when he needs it. Just when the worst of the grief is starting to kick in.

This time, Danny stays home and cooks while Steve drives Mary and Joanie to the airport. While the household that was momentarily four goes back down to one.

Back home, Steve shuffles inside, close to tears and sick to his stomach; the smell of butter and herbs fixes neither, but eases both.

They eat on the couch. Danny says nothing when Steve can barely finish half a bowl, still nothing when Steve gives in and quietly starts to cry. He just slings an arm around Steve’s back, and stays.

*

Danny’s around more or less _constantly_ , after the transplant. While Danny was still recovering too, it was just practical to have them both in the same place. But once he starts sleeping at his house again, he’s over at least once a day. And even after he goes back to work he’s still around more evenings than not.

One such evening, Steve wakes on the couch to the sound of dishes clinking. He drags himself upright, breathes through the headrush, and, once he can, stumbles blearily into the kitchen.

Last night had been so bad he’d slept on the bathroom floor. In morning he’d managed to shower—but not before he’d been forced to sit on the edge of the tub for a few minutes, his initial attempt at standing bringing him frighteningly close to blacking out.

Leave it to Danny to sense his worst day, even out of a string of pretty bad ones.

At the threshold of the kitchen, Steve leans heavily on the doorframe; Danny glances up, brow instantly creasing. “You hungry?”

“Dunno,” Steve mumbles. “Haven’t been keepin’ anythin’ down.”

“Not surprised. You look like shit,” Danny sighs, and turns back to the stovetop. “Lie back down, if you want, this’s got another ten minutes to go.”

So Steve does.

He wakes, this time, to Danny’s hand on his forehead, brushing his hair back. Danny’s voice, clucking. “You’ve got a fever, babe.”

“I know.”

“Can you sit up?”

Steve nods, and struggles upright; gets one foot on the floor before the dizziness is too much, and he falters. “Stop,” Danny orders, touching his hair again. “I’ll bring it in, man, you don’t gotta get up.”

Steve falls back to the cushions. Closes his eyes, but doesn’t sleep; listens to the footsteps as Danny goes back to the kitchen and returns a moment later.

He lets Danny help him up. Lets Danny prop him in the corner of the couch, put the bowl in his lap and the spoon in his hand.

He scoops a big spoonful of chicken and noodles.

Then his stomach turns, and he can only stare.

Danny settles beside him, and nudges his hand so the spoon empties itself into the bowl. “Hey, hey. Just try a little broth, okay? You can come back for the rest. It’s not a race.”

Steve nods. Has a few mouthfuls of broth, then waits; Danny rubs his back in slow, easy circles.

The broth stays down, so Steve eats a matzo ball. That stays down too, so he has some noodles, and a few of the carrots.

And, in the end, getting something warm in his stomach helps—a lot. His insides settle and he lets Danny take the bowl away as he curls up and savors the sheer relief of simply _not being nauseous._

The relief itself is exhausting. So much so that when Steve falls asleep again, on Danny’s shoulder this time, he barely even knows it.

*

There’s a steady stream, for a while. A massive pot—no more thermoses—at least once a month. And post-transplant worry transitions to post-radiation worry more or less seamlessly.

It’s not that Steve likes to watch Danny worry. He doesn’t like it. He just—needs it, sometimes.

But he needs it less, as time passes. Steve takes his meds, starts seeing a therapist; he adopts Eddie (and Junior) and spends his free time working on the restaurant. Stuff’s pretty okay, for a while. Danny doesn’t seem to worry as much, and Steve finds himself actually kind of proud of that.

*

Then Joe dies.

Steve doesn’t even see Danny for over a month; once he does, it’s another week or two before he lets himself be comforted.

Once he does, though, he dives in headfirst. Spends three solid days curled up on Danny’s couch, accepting cookies and cuddles and tissues from not only Danny but the kids as well.

No soup, though. Probably because Steve doesn’t let Danny out of his sight long enough for the guy to go grocery shopping.

Still, those days help. They pull Steve out of absolute, abject despair and keep him standing long enough to find some semblance of footing again.

He tries to let that be enough. He leaned on Danny too much after Deb died; this time he keeps it more to himself, and reaches out elsewhere when he can’t. He leans on Lou, and Jerry, and his therapist. _Especially_ after Gracie’s accident, Danny has more to worry about that just Steven McGarrett.

He manages, to a certain extent. Losing Joe was one giant step backwards, but it never could have been anything else. And it’s nothing he hasn’t been through before.

But this time’s different; he can’t deny that with Deb and Joe both gone, he feels, well, orphaned. Again. Ridiculous, for a man his age, but true. He has friends; he has people he can call on. If he ever starts a family (not that that seems likely), his kids will have more aunts and uncles than they’ll know what to do with.

But they’ll be nobody’s grandchildren.

He’s nobody’s son.

And that eats at him, little by little, day by day, and all the dinners at Lou’s place and movie nights at Jerry’s just aren’t enough to keep him standing. He’d been getting better. Now, some days, it seems he’s never felt worse.

It’s especially bad one Friday, at the office. Last night he cried three or four times in therapy, then came home and petted Eddie for half an hour before he could shower and eat and put himself to bed. He’d barely slept. And when he’d woken, he’d remembered that Danny was taking the day off for a thing at Charlie’s school—and, really, he should have just given up on the day then and there.

He didn’t, of course. But now he finds himself staring into space, kind of almost hoping for a murder, to give him something to do.

No murders come.

He tries to make a chore list for the weekend; he needs to go grocery shopping, if nothing else. He’s out of coffee, and milk, and dish soap. He’s been out of paper towels for ages now. He grabs a pen and paper, starts to write his list; and stops, when he comes ‘round to food items. What’s he in the mood for? He can’t remember the last time he had an appetite.

No, he can. It was last week, when Danny made him pancakes, and how pathetic is that, really? It’s pretty pathetic. Maybe he should make pancakes tonight. His are just as good as Danny’s, maybe even a little fluffier; but it’s hardly about pancake skills, in the end.

And then it hits him, like a fucking hammer: he wants soup. What he genuinely, and maybe exclusively, wants for dinner, is matzo ball soup.

It wouldn’t be that hard to make. He could use box broth, and rotisserie chicken—Danny uses that a lot of the time anyway. He could even get frozen veggies, if he had to, though that’s its own brand of pathetic. But how the hell do you make matzo balls? And what the hell are those noodles Danny uses—they’re not any kind of pasta shape Steve recognizes, but he can’t imagine using anything else.

Oh, fuck, he really wants soup. Salty, oniony broth and carrots and shredded chicken, skinny little noodles that he shoves into his mouth by the spoonful—and the matzo balls, _plural_ , because Danny would never give him just one, lumpy and bready and a little bit spongey as he slices through them with his spoon—

He actually opens a tab on his computer and searches _where to get matzo ball soup in honolulu_ before closing the whole window in frustration.

It’s after 1700, and he hasn’t even finished his grocery list yet. He glances back at it, surprised and embarrassed to see the sparse, sloppy letters wavering on the page, coming to his eyes through a filter of tears.

Steve puts his head in his hands.

He can do one of two things: he can suck it up, google a recipe, and make himself soup. Or he can have something else for dinner.

Google a recipe and make himself soup, or have something else for dinner.

Come on.

 _Choose, McGarrett_.

It takes a few minutes for him to wrap his head around option three.

Because there is an option three.

Because not leaning too hard on Danny doesn’t mean not leaning on Danny at all, and yeah, maybe Danny’s got plans with Rachel, and maybe he won’t be able to—but even if he doesn’t tonight, he probably will tomorrow—and he’s Steve’s best fucking friend, for Chrissake, and he would be furious—worse, he’d be _hurt_ —if he knew about Steve hesitating to ask for something so simple, something that , for some reason, he needs so damn much—

Steve puts his head up. Grabs his phone. Texts Danny, _make me soup_. Then, in a separate message: _please_.

For a minute or two there’s nothing, and Steve sits frozen, feeling useless and miserable.

Then his phone buzzes, and he reads: _there in 30ish_.

So Steve gets up, and goes home. Goes into the kitchen, and waits.

It isn’t long before he hears the front door open; then familiar, short-strided footsteps. Then Danny appears, carrying two overfull shopping bags.

“Aw, jeez, babe,” he murmurs, looking Steve over. “Something happen today?”

Steve shakes his head.

“Okay. Okay. Si’down.”

The table’s too far; the counter’s too high. Instead Steve sinks to the floor, pulling his knees to his chest, glad he didn’t take his sneakers off or else his feet would surely slip on the tile. As it is he can stay comfortably tucked up. So he rests his head against the cabinet, drapes his arms atop his knees, and lets his eyes half-close. Eddie joins him, puts his head on Steve’s chest.

Danny sets to work, setting out pots and knives and a cutting board. It occurs to Steve, then, that he’s never actually watched Danny make his soup before; he lets himself stare, through the haze of his eyelashes.

Danny notices before long, and turns to him, eyebrow raised. He proffers an onion. “Want an excuse?”

Steve feels himself smile, just a little, as he shakes his head; no, he doesn’t want to cry, and he doesn’t want to help chop veggies, either. Just wants to sit. Just wants to watch.

Danny turns away again. He chops the onions and celery and puts them, with butter, in the big pot; then he salts some water and sets it to boil in the smaller one. Shreds the chicken and adds it, with broth, to the veggies. Then he pulls out a little blue box (matzo ball mix? It’s just a mix? Steve chuckles, quietly) and sets about mixing and rolling. The matzo balls go into the boiling water. Noodles and carrots go into the soup, and Danny holds a wooden spoon in each hand and carefully stirs both pots.

Not until Danny nudges him awake, foot to his calf, does Steve realize how far into sleep he’s actually drifted.

“Soup’s on,” Danny grunts. “Not a figure of speech.”

Danny not only gets him to his feet, but keeps a hand on his waist as he toddles across the kitchen, wobbly-kneed, relief-drunk. He guides Steve to the couch. Deposits him there, then turns on the TV and goes back into the kitchen.

And then, a minute later, there’s a bowl of soup in Steve’s lap. Muted by fabric, the ceramic is pleasantly warm against his thighs; and Danny’s warm too, as he settles directly at Steve’s side.

Some sitcom’s on, and nobody bothers to change the channel. Steve dips his spoon into the soup, capturing broth and a small piece of chicken.

He slides the spoon into his mouth; the soup tastes as wonderful as ever; for half a moment, though, the lump in his throat feels too big to swallow past. Still he manages. And what comes next feels like nothing so much as finally managing to light a match, when you’ve been in the dark for a long, long time.

When he finishes the first bowl, Danny gets him a second one. When he finishes the second, Danny gets him a third. When he finishes the third, Danny musses up his hair, before going to the kitchen and returning not with more soup, but with a bowl of fruit salad and two whiskey sours.

They drink their drinks, and pick at the fruit. Steve’s pleasantly full, and the liquor hits him nice and slow. When it’s time for Danny to make a second round of sours, they switch off the TV and go drink them on the lanai instead.

The fruit comes with them, but they mostly ignore it. Instead they get through their second whiskies a little faster than their first, and by the time they’re finished, Steve’s tipsy enough to curl up against Danny’s shoulder with no hesitation. Danny gets comfortable beneath him, then hugs him with one arm.

“You wanna talk?” he asks, after a while.

By now Steve’s got his eyes closed, though he’s not sleeping, just resting. He sniffles, shifts a bit. “Maybe t’morrow?”

“Yeah. Whatever works, babe.”

“T’morrow. T’day I just—I jus’ wanted—”

“Soup?”

“Yeah.”

“ _Ohhkay_ ,” Danny breathes, making each syllable a few beats long. “I’ll make you soup, babe. When you need it. You jus’ tell me.”

“Mm. Mm-hm.”

“Okay. Hey, close your eyes, if you want.”

“Th’y’re already closed,” Steve laughs.

“Right. Okay. Well, sleep a little, then. It’s a nice night. We don’t gotta go back inside anytime soon.”

Danny shifts, until Steve is a bit less on top of him, a bit more cradled against his side. His fingers find Steve’s hair, and he strokes it idly. “I’m glad you asked,” he murmurs. “I’m proud of you.”

Steve can only nod. Nothing’s fixed; nothing’s even different, really, except that there’s food in his stomach and whiskey in his bloodstream, and Danny’s fingers in his hair. And the combination of these makes him feel like he can breathe, for the first time in a long time. He nuzzles closer.

It’s not that he likes it, when Danny worries.

But yeah, now and then, Steve’s okay with being worried about.

**Author's Note:**

> Still alive :) keep thinking, this will be the week that I really sit down and write! But then it keeps not happening. Such is life. Hope all is well with all of you <3


End file.
